It was raining heavily by the time Nathaniel reached his destination. The tall building he approached was guarded against every viable approach by well-armed senior members of the city watch and was surrounded by a tall stone wall with a large well-constructed metal gate.

Considering his station, the city lord's homestead was a fairly modest affair. It had two floors and had enough room to house about six people comfortably.

Nathaniel slowed his horse down, then dismounted in a hurry, paying the beast no further attention.

He nearly tripped as his foremost foot met the slick cobblestone. As quick as he could, he approached a nearby guardpost. It didn't amount to much more than a wooden overhang attached to a wide, vertical wooden wall, perhaps 6 foot across, pressed into the ground. It stood freestanding about 10 feet in front of the gate.

The two guards seemed to react poorly to his sudden approach until they recognised him.

"Lord McKinley? What are you doing here at this time?" one of the guards asked, removing his grip from the blade at his waist and signalling to his colleague to do the same.

"No time, soldier. I need to see the lord, now. He's going to want to hear what I have to say." Nathaniel was obviously out of breath and his hair was stuck to his face. He didn't look the part, but he carried his usual sense of authority with him in his voice.

Nathaniel only stopped by them for a moment to spit out this sentence. Then, he made his way towards the gate, expecting them to follow him, which they did.

The guards opened the gate for Nathaniel, swayed by the seriousness in his tone. It was fortunate for Nathaniel that he was in the position that he was. Not just any noble could demand such a meeting, perhaps a handful had earned this right. In this case, he knew he was justified.

He squeezed through as soon as the gate was opened enough for him to get inside.

He took a few step forwards, then just before he reached the front door he saw that he'd broken through the magical alarm constructs that had been placed outside the building. Within moments, two individuals dressed in long, purposely obscuring robes made their way into his path from a small wooden shack within the confines of the stone walls.

They made their way in front of Nathaniel, blocking him. He walked up to them even as he saw them gathering varying types of mana in their hands. He made no threatening gestures, then spoke to the two Arcanists. "We have a dark mana problem." Nathaniel sounded exasperated but serious.

His gaze swept to each of the Arcanists blocking his path, making sure he saw understanding in their eyes past the veils. Their body language betrayed their immediate concern. The mana in their hands faded and Nathaniel pushed past them.

Ordinarily, the guards carried objects that would allow them to disable the magical alarms that summoned the city lord's personal Arcanists. Nathaniel hadn't given them a chance.

This, of course, had been on purpose. He'd wanted these Arcanists to hear exactly what he'd come here for as soon as possible, even if the city lord refused to help.

Nathaniel was allowed inside, where he trailed water through the halls. He was on his way through a small hallway leading towards the back of the home. Nathaniel knew where the living room was, and figured that was his best bet at this hour.

Just before he got there, he heard a familiar voice call out from the kitchen.

"Nat? What're you doing here? Why are you dragging water through my house?"

A lighter than usual masculine voice that was obviously feigning amusement grabbed Nathaniel's attention. He stopped in his tracks and turned to the entrance to the kitchen where he saw a man dressed in extremely well-tailored night robes. His colour scheme was entirely dark, dull colours which caused the various pieces of his outfit to blend. He wore very out of place work boots and stood in front of a pot. Evidently, he was tasting something that his staff had made for him earlier that evening. He was a little older than Nathaniel and age not been kind to him, his hair was shock white and his skin was showing signs of ageing well past his 50-some years.

"Victor, we need to talk." Nathaniel was all business and approached the city lord without hesitation.

"Alright." Victor placed down the small wooden spoon he was holding, gently setting his uneaten sample of soup back into the pot. He gestured towards the door and he and Nathaniel walked into the living room. Nathaniel didn't wait for them to arrive before he started talking.

"There's a demon in the city."

Nathaniel was never known to mince his words when it came to crunch time, so Victor was already mentally prepared for him to say something strange. Even so, he did not expect that in particular. Victor's response was delayed by just a moment, his demeanour changed from feigned amusement to a serious scowl.

"Explain."

"Someone broke into my museum. They stole Vesiliant's skeleton and used my son's blood to circumvent the warding I put in place to prevent the entrance of demons. The guards outside exhibited typical signs of having been placed under demonic mind-altering magic. Dark mana in the eyes. Victor, I won't waste your time, I think the demon is amongst the Sellanion family."

Victor went to reply, a hint of anger swelling up, but Nathaniel interrupted him.

"I know, I know. Of course, I come in here and point the finger at the family that I get along with the least, but I promise you that this isn't some petty aristocratic ploy. Leslie Sellanion was involved in a plot to harm my son and his friend earlier today. As far as I can tell, the attack was orchestrated by her brother Duncan, but she warned my son."

"It sounds to me like she helped your boy, no?"

"On the surface. But you know James, Victor. There's no way he'd leave something like this. The boy is impulsive but has a heart of gold and he's protective to a fault. She knew he'd run straight into the middle of things without so much as a thought. I believe that she was trying to get hold of his blood for this demon so that it could get inside the museum. I will not pretend to understand her motivation for doing so. I have no other serious leads at the moment."

Before Victor could respond, Nathaniel spelt out his desires.

"Look, Victor, I just want you to help me find the girl. If she's working with a demon, she can help us find it, if she's possessed by one, I can coax it out of her. If not, we can rule her out."

"And her father? What will you do about him?"

"Kaine? I couldn't care less about Kaine right now. I'm sure we'll have a lovely long conversation about this at some point, but that's for later. Will you help me or not? It's your word I'll need to get past him and we don't have a lot of time. The demon was sloppy and left evidence, so whatever it's doing, it's doing right now. If she's not at home, I can't search the city alone, Victor."

Victor looked at Nathaniel, who was covered in a mixture of sweat and rain and smelled terrible. His hair and clothes clung to him and his voice was strained. Everything about him painted a picture of a man in the midst of an ordeal. His eyes, however, were calm.

That, more than anything, told Victor a story.

Victor knew this man well, his history with the empire, his fervour for hunting down creatures of the night. Nathaniel was a lot of things, but he did not think a liar was one of them.

"Alright. Fine. You have my approval. We'll start at the Sellanion household as a matter of course. I'll dispatch the watch."

Nathaniel's shoulders dropped an inch in relief.

"I'll contact the college, they need to know something is going on. I'll try to gather some of the Arcanists in the city to join your squads, they'll want the backup."

The city lord went about organising the gathering of his city guard and Nathaniel began to gather allies to his side, sending them out with the squads. He visited the masters at the university and warned them of the presence of a demon within the city limits.

Rightly so, they were on high alert for the rest of the night. A few of the masters even opted to join the search squads, including both Hodson and Noelle.

Like that, the city was scoured through the night. The operation was as quiet as one of this size could be. For the most part, the guards carried it out like a routine inspection, visiting public establishments and asking around for signs of trouble. The fact some of the guards were occasionally accompanied by Arcanists certainly raised a few eyebrows, though.

Nathaniel opted to personally attend the necessary visit to the Sellanion household, it was the most likely location they'd find Leslie and even if they didn't, they'd certainly find Kaine, who might know something. Considering Kaine's legendary temper, Nathaniel asked Master Noelle to join him.

In the middle of the night, the two Arcanists approached the Sellanion household joined by a cohort of city guardsman. The Sellanion household was guarded much more heavily than most noble households, they had somewhere in the region of thirty private guards on their grounds at any one point in time.

"Kaine has a lot of enemies," Nathaniel explained to Noelle.

"I can see that. He's certainly paranoid."

A handful of those very same private guards made a good show of blocking the path of the Arcanists and the city watch, though it was just that, a show.

"What are you doing here? State your business." A clearly nervous man stepped forward from the group, meeting Nathaniel's eye.

"We're here to speak with young Ms Sellanion, is she here?" Noelle decided to speak up, she was the better conversationalist.

When the guards learned they weren't necessarily in immediate danger of a fight, they seemed relieved.

"Yes, Master Arcanist. However, the lord of the house will be most displeased to be bothered at this time of night, perhaps it would be best for you to return in the morning."

Nathaniel was practically overheating. An impressive feat in the rain. Noelle answered in his stead.

"I'm sorry young man, that simply won't do. I'm afraid we'll have to displease the lord of the house. It's extremely important, it's part of a city-wide search, you see."

Noelle seemed particularly proficient in reading this young guardsman. It seemed she'd noticed that he was either looking for a way to get rid of them or a "no way out" scenario in which he can pass the responsibility of this matter to his master. She gave him the latter.

The house guards briefly discussed, but they eventually decided it was worth disturbing Kaine. Besides, it wasn't like they could physically stop two fully-fledged Arcanists if they decided to enter without their approval.

Moments later, one of the guards headed inside to wake Kaine.

After a minute or so, the large, well-built patriarch of the Sellanion family made himself known. He stepped out onto his front porch, concealed from the rain by the small overhang of wood above the doorway.

"What's the meaning of this, Nat?" Kaine sounded about as pissed-off as usual. Nathaniel supposed he couldn't blame him this time. It must've been nearly midnight, perhaps later. It always irked Nathaniel that Kaine insisted on calling him "Nat" like they were friends. He'd hated that for as long as he could remember.

"Is Leslie inside? We need to speak to her."

"What on earth could you possibly need to speak to my daughter for in the middle of the night? That's hardly appropriate, Nat."

"You didn't answer my question, Kaine." Nathaniel was getting visibly irritated. He didn't know why but this man had always rubbed him the wrong way. Yes, he was largely a terrible person, but even when Kaine was presenting himself as reasonable, something always bothered Nathaniel but he could never put his finger on it.

"Of course she's inside, dullard. It's the middle of the night. Where else would she be?"

"You won't mind if we check?"

"I absolutely do mind. You're not stepping foot inside my home."

"And what if I told you that we're here on the city lord's authority?"

Nathaniel watched as that certainly caused Kaine to clench his jaw a little. Kaine was impulsive, arrogant, corrupt, easy to anger and held a million other flaws, but Nathaniel knew that at the very least, he knew not to bite off the hand that feeds. Even in his high station, the city lord could directly punish him, even if most of the guards couldn't touch the man.

Kaine looked over the dozen or more men Nathaniel had brought from the city watch. Nathaniel didn't have the authority to summon that sort of response on his own outside of an emergency, so he knew there'd be legitimacy to his claim. Through clenched teeth, Kaine made a concession, though his eyes seemed to be furious at the rest of him for doing so.

"Fine. You two, no others. I don't need my house ruined by dozens of filthy boots. Two wet rats dragging in water will create more than enough work for my servants tomorrow." Kaine gestured to Noelle and Nathaniel, then turned and walked into his home. The two Arcanists followed, ordering their squad to take up positions outside the house.

Kaine led them by candlelight through his home. He was silent on the way, no doubt cursing them incessantly in his head. They reached the second floor where Leslie's bedroom was and Kaine knocked gently on the door.

Nathaniel found slight amusement in the way he saw Kaine tap on the door as if he was afraid to wake her, he'd never seen a side of Kaine other than fury and violence. He must have a very soft spot for Leslie. As a precaution, Nathaniel had prepared a very specific light mana construct that he had coursing through himself in a transference shell in case he truly did encounter a demon.

Noelle didn't know the light shift, but she maintained physical contact with Nathaniel at all times. If need be, he could send light mana into her in an instant.

Kaine waited for a moment, glaring at his guests. He didn't hear a response, so knocked again, this time a little louder.

Nathaniel was losing patience and was about to force the door open when Kaine beat him to it. In a sudden switch of personality that Nathaniel found terrifying to behold, he saw Kaine burst through the door like he had a grudge against it.

Noelle gave Nathaniel a concerned look that said "What's with this guy?"

Nathaniel shrugged. He whispered, "He's been like this for...well, ages."

"Leslie!" Kaine yelled into the room. When Nathaniel and Noelle followed him in, they discovered a well-organized young girls bedroom filled with toys from her younger years and books from her later ones. It had a large, comfortable-looking poster bed and a small writing desk with scattered paperwork and jewellery on its surface.

Casting his eyes over the room, Nathaniel found it was empty. Kaine didn't say anything but pushed past the two, going out into the hallway, where he frantically began searching the house for his daughter. Before long, he was yelling for her at the top of his lungs. No doubt, he woke everyone in the household.

Noelle started poking through the books at Leslie's writing desk, largely uninterested. She looked over at Nathaniel, speaking quietly.

"Well, she's not here."

"Yeah. That tells us something, at least."

Nathaniel joined her at the table, moving some of the papers around with his fingertips. It looked to be rough notes on some basic Arcane principles, shaping, mostly.

He started to search the room. He decided that while Kaine was scouring the house, making all of that noise, he'd take the moment to investigate.

While he was looking around, he heard Noelle make a surprised sound. He looked over and saw her with her hand under the desk, reaching towards the back. With a little tug, she pulled loose a leatherbound book.

"Well, well, well," Noelle said out loud, flipping the book over in her hands to see the cover. She grimaced when she looked at it and tossed it over to Nathaniel, who caught it and looked for himself.

The cover read "The Narrow Hills."

It was a book that Nathaniel had seen once before. He flipped it open and saw exactly what he'd expected.

The book was a story, a novel. It told the tale of a boy becoming lost in a place called "The Narrow Hills" which the book describes as some sort of alternate world inhabited by terrible creatures. The boy travels the length of the valley between the hills, meeting the people who somehow make this inhospitable hellscape a home as he goes and encountering nightmarish monsters every other day.

By some miracle, he survives the ordeal and goes on to write this very book about his experiences.

The author of the novel is listed as "Cintra" which, incidentally, was the name of the protagonist. All of that was perfectly reasonable, but the book held a dark secret, one Nathaniel had learned of the last time he'd seen it.

Hidden amongst the text of the novel were instructions on how to, as the book describes it, "Summon a creature from the narrow hills."

In reality, it was a demon summoning spell. Nathaniel had enjoyed destroying the last copy of this book that he found. He'd enjoy this time just as much.

For now, he'd need it as evidence, but he still looked forward to it. In some circles, people believed that there was truth to the story. Nathaniel had always admitted this theory was viable, but thus far, nobody had proven the existence of any place that matched the description of "The Narrow Hills".

Nathaniel had just tucked the book into his backpack when he saw Kaine reappear in the doorway, covered in sweat and distraught.

"Where is she?!" He shouted into the room.

"That's what we came here to find out, Kaine. I'm just going to tell you what I think. I suspect that your daughter may have summoned a demon."

Kaine's jaw hit the floor, then fury filled his eyes.

"How dare you accuse my angel of such a despicable thing!?" Kaine exploded. He stepped forward as he spoke, hands raised, approaching Nathaniel with obviously hostile intent.

"Kaine." Nathaniel used the calmest voice he could muster. "I'm not trying to insult you. I'm telling you my honest opinion. We can argue about this later, first and foremost, we have to find her, right?" He began walking towards Kaine as he spoke, arms raised with palms open in a non-threatening manner.

He'd known Kaine long enough to know that he was likely to lose his cool, best to try and get him to calm down. It didn't work.

Kaine grabbed hold of Nathaniel by the arm and pulled him close.

"You listen here. When I find her and prove her innocent, I will see to it that the city lord has you whipped for such an outrageous, outlandish-"

Seconds after the two made contact, Nathaniel felt something very strange happen. The light mana he had coursing through his body suddenly reacted without his interference.

When he'd shaped the light construct, the specifications were very clear.

While it was active within his transference shell, whenever he came into contact with someone, the construct would try to locate dark mana within them. If it did, the construct would leave his body, enter theirs and attempt to counteract the dark mana that was located.

He'd learned to prepare it like this a long time ago to handle surprise assaults from demons or to protect allies from them more easily and had done so tonight for Noelle's benefit.

Now, instead, the construct flooded into Kaine. Moments later, the scowl on his face faded away, his eyes went wide and he was stricken with obvious confusion. Kaine staggered back a step, releasing Nathaniel and staring at his hands.

Then, Kaine's eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed to the ground in a heap, unconscious.